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Wednesday, August 28, 2013

Sears Catalog Home

Sears Catalog Homes (sold as Sears Modern Homes) were ready-to-assemble kit houses sold through mail order by Sears, Roebuck and Company, an American retailer. More than 70,000 of these were sold in North America between 1908 and 1940. Shipped via railroad boxcars,
these kits included all the materials needed to build a house. Many
were assembled by the new homeowner and friends, relatives, and
neighbors, in a fashion similar to the traditional barn-raisings of farming families.

Sears offered the latest technology available to house buyers in the early part of the twentieth century. Central heating, indoor plumbing, and electricity
were all new developments in house design that "Modern Homes"
incorporated, although not all of the houses were designed with these
conveniences.

Central heating, for example, not only improved the livability of houses with little insulation but also improved fire safety, a worry in an era when open flames threatened houses and even entire cities, as in the Great Chicago Fire (1871).

As demand increased, Sears expanded the product line to feature houses
that varied in expense to meet the budgets of various buyers. Sears
began offering financing plans in 1916. However, the company experienced
steadily rising payment defaults throughout the Great Depression,
resulting in increasing strain for the catalog house program. More than
370 designs of Sears Homes were offered during the program's 32-year
history. The mortgage portion of the program was discontinued in 1934
after Sears was forced to liquidate $11 million in defaulted debt. Sears
closed their Modern Homes department in 1940. A few years later, all
sales records were destroyed during a corporate house cleaning. As only a
small percentage of these homes have been documented, finding these
houses today often requires detailed research to properly identify them.

Today, some communities across the United States feature clusters of the houses as unofficial historical sites. Elgin, Illinois
(a Chicago suburb) has the largest known collection of Sears Homes,
with more than 200 Sears Homes (and few kit homes from other companies
as well). Sears homes are found in a large area of the United States
with homes as far south as Florida and as far west as California.

Competitors in the kit home market included Aladdin,
Gordon-Van Tine, Harris Brothers, Pacific Ready Cut Homes, Sterling and
Wardway Homes. Because these competitors often copied plan elements or
designs from each other, there are a number of kit models that look
similar or identical to each other. Determining which company
manufactured a particular kit home may require additional research to
determine the origin of a particular kit home.

Sears mail order history

In 1886, the United States contained only 38 states. Many people lived in rural areas and typically farmed. Richard Sears had been a railroad station agent in Minnesota. He moved to Chicago, Illinois, where he met Alvah C. Roebuck who agreed to join him in business. In 1893, the corporation name became Sears, Roebuck and Co.

Richard Sears knew that farmers often brought their crops to town
where they could be sold and shipped, and then bought supplies, often at
very high prices, from local general stores. He and Roebuck offered a solution via mail-order catalogs. Thanks to volume buying, railroads, post offices, and later rural free delivery and parcel post, they offered a welcome alternative to the high-priced rural stores.

By 1894, the Sears catalog had grown to 322 pages, featuring sewing machines, bicycles, sporting goods and a host of other new items. By the following year, dolls, icebox refrigerators, cook-stoves and groceries
had been added to the catalog. Sears, Roebuck and Co. soon developed a
reputation for both quality products and customer satisfaction. Its wide
range of products was very popular, especially in areas far flung from
big cities and large department stores. People had learned to trust
Sears for other products bought through mail-order, and thus, sight
unseen. This laid important groundwork for supplying a house, possibly the largest single investment a typical family would ever make.

Sears Modern Homes 1908–1940

Catalog image and floorplan of Sears Magnolia model

In 1906, Frank W. Kushel, a Sears manager, was given responsibility
for the catalog company's unwieldy, non-profitable building materials
department. Sales were down, and there was excess inventory languishing
in warehouses. He is credited with suggesting to Richard Sears that the
company assemble kits of all the parts needed and sell entire houses through mail order.

In 1908, Sears issued its first specialty catalog for houses, Book of Modern Homes and Building Plans, featuring 22 styles ranging in price from US$650–$2,500 ($17,113 - $65,823 in 2013 dollars). Sears bought a lumber mill in Southern Illinois and arranged for production of kits from which homes could be assembled. The first mail order was filled in 1909.

Shipped by railroad boxcar,
and then usually trucked to a home site, the average Sears Modern Home
kit had 25 tons of materials, with over 30,000 parts, and came with such
utilities as electric and gaslight fixtures in early models. Plumbing
and electrical fixtures and heating systems were not included in the
kit, but could be purchased separately. Local building requirements
sometimes dictated that those items be done professionally and varied to
meet requirements of each area of the country.

For example, foundation
depth requirements varied by climate and terrain.

The Aladdin Company of Bay City, Michigan,
was the first to offer kit homes (in 1906), and Sears joined the fray
in 1908. However, Sears mail-order catalogs were already in millions of
homes, enabling large numbers of potential homeowners simply to open a
catalog, select and visualize their new home, dream, save, and then
purchase it. Sears offered financing, assembly instructions, and
guarantees. Early mortgage loans were typically for 5–15 years at 6%–7% interest.

The ability to mass-produce the materials used in Sears homes
lessened manufacturing costs, which lowered purchase costs for
customers. Precut and fitted materials, first offered in 1916, reduced
construction time by up to 40%. Sears's use of "balloon style" framing systems did not require a team of skilled carpenters, as did previous methods. Balloon frames were built faster and generally only required one carpenter. This system used precut timber of mostly standard sizes (2"x4"
and 2"x8") for framing. Precut timber, fitted pieces, and the
convenience of having everything, including the nails, shipped by
railroad directly to the customer added to the popularity of this
framing style.

During the Modern Homes program, large quantities of asphalt shingles became available. The alternative roofing materials available included tin and wood.
Tin was noisy during storms, looked unattractive, and required a
skilled roofer, while wood was highly flammable. Asphalt shingles,
however, were cheap to manufacture and ship, and easy and inexpensive to
install. A later feature was the use of drywall instead of plaster and lath
wall-building techniques which required skilled carpenters. Drywall
offered the advantages of low price, ease of installation, and added
fire protection. It was also a good fit for the square design of Sears
homes.

As a retailer, the company was much more focused on offering what
customers would purchase. The Modern Homes features of central heating,
indoor plumbing, and electrical wiring were the first steps for many
families to modern HVAC systems, kitchens, and bathrooms.

As sales grew, Sears expanded production, shipping and sales offices
to regional sites across the US, hitting its peak in 1929, just before
the Great Depression.
By then, the least expensive model was under US $1,000; the highest
priced was under US $4,400 ($13,687 and $60,225 in 2013 dollars
respectively).

Models

Over the 32 years that Sears offered homes, Sears offered 370
different models. In the early years, the models were identified with
numbers. After several years, Sears also begin assigning names to the
various models, a convention that carried through to the end of the
program. Some models were offered in variations that included expanded
floor plans. Sears houses could also be ordered with reversed floor
plans.

Certain models were more popular than others and these models were
offered over multiple years. Other models were only offered for one year
and some models that were offered have yet to be identified as ever
having been actually built. Some homes were offered in both wood siding
and brick versions with different names attributed to the same home
plan. The models listed below are some of the most common models.

The largest and most expensive Sears model was the Magnolia. Only seven Magnolias are known to be still standing. One Magnolia in Lincoln, Nebraska was demolished.

Identifying Sears Modern Homes

Catalog image of the column detail on the Vallonia model

Shipping Label from a Sears house

The absence of archived records for houses sold through the Sears
Modern Homes division requires identification of existing Sears homes to
be done on a house by house basis with the exception of known build
sites like Carlinville, Illinois. Kit house expert Rose Thornton has
identified the following steps for identifying and authenticating a
Sears Catalog house.

1. Sears Catalog homes were only offered between 1908 and 1940. Any
homes built before 1908 or that were built after 1940 can not be a Sears
Catalog home. However, there is some debate about whether some homes
built in 1941 and 1942 qualify as Sears Catalog homes.

2. Stamped lumber: Most easily found in unfinished spaces like a
basement or attic, framing members were stamped with a letter and a
number.
3. Unique column arrangements: A number of Sears models had a unique column arrangement on the front porch.
4. Five piece eave brackets: Several Sears models that had eaves brackets used a 5 piece design that was unique to Sears houses.
5. Original paperwork for the house including blueprints and letters of correspondence.
6. Public records: From 1911 to 1933, Sears offered home mortgages
and Sears company officials or the Sears corporation may be named on the
mortgage. Cities that have records of building permits may list Sears
as the original architect.
7. Shipping labels: Often found on the back of millwork like
baseboard molding or door and window trim, shipping labels associated
with Sears may indicate that the home is a Sears Catalog house. However,
millwork could be purchased from Sears so this is not a definitive
indicator of a Sears Catalog house.
8. Compare house designs using a book with original catalog images
and good quality photos. Some models of Sears homes were very similar in
design to models offered by other kit home manufacturers or through
plan books. Designs may have been modified but generally should match in
design and dimensions.
9. Sears Catalog homes built in the 1930s may have a small circled
“SR” cast into the bathtub in the lower corner (furthest from the tub
spout and near the floor) and on the underside of the kitchen or
bathroom sink.
10. Goodwall sheet plaster was an early drywall product offered by Sears and may be an indication of a Sears Catalog house.

Heritage

Clusters of Sears Catalog homes can still be found in the United
States. Cities with large numbers of documented Sears Catalog Homes
include:

Ann Arbor, Michigan with 35

Arlington, Virginia

Aurora, Illinois with 136

Carlinville, Illinois with 152

Cincinnati, Ohio and surrounding communities

Des Plaines, Illinois

Downers Grove, Illinois with 27

Elgin, Illinois with over 200

Houston, Texas' historic Norhill neighborhood is known to have many of these homes.

The Carlinville, Illinois concentration is notable because the houses were bought in bulk by the Standard Oil Company
in 1918, to house its mineworkers, at a cost of approximately US $1
million. The houses, comprising eight different styles, were all placed
in a 12-block area known as Standard Addition. Building took nine
months, and was completed in 1919. The bulk order was supposedly the
largest order ever made for Sears Homes, and led to Sears, Roebuck
naming their "Carlin" model after the city.

Not all Sears homes became private residences. At Greenlawn Cemetery, near the Hampton Roads waterfront in the Newport News, Virginia, area, the cemetery office building is a 1936 Sears Catalog Home.

Sears Homes have become increasingly popular among history
enthusiasts because of their sturdy structure, unusual building and
architectural design concepts. However, many houses described as Sears
Homes are not true Sears Homes, being either the product of another kit
home manufacturer, such as Aladdin, Lewis Manufacturing, Sterling Homes,
Montgomery Ward, Gordon Van Tine or Harris Brothers, or not a kit home
at all.

National Register of Historic Places

Several Sears catalog houses are listed on the National Register of Historic Places

Alhambra - At Triangle Ranch near Philips, South Dakota

Saratoga - The Hogue House in Chelsea, Oklahoma

Sears catalog houses can also be found in historic districts listed in the National Register of Historic Places

Modern Interpretations of Sears Catalog Houses

There are examples of modern homes have been built based on the
design of Sears Catalog homes. In some cases, homeowners used plans from
original Sears Catalog homes to recreate a modern version of a Sears
home. In other cases, the home followed the general design of a Sears
house without being an exact duplicate. In any case, these homes, while
following the design of a Sears homes, are not considered a Sears
Catalog house.

Kilbourne - Pleasanton, California

One unique replica of a Sears catalog house is the Hillrose model at the "Farm at Prophetstown" museum in Battle Ground, Indiana. The house forms part of the farmstead at the museum.